Returing to god after seemingly no hope of return

Question

Hi Rabbi , hope you doing well, i had a question , was wondering in judaism if a person is probably sick in his / her mental state and trying to heal and acknowleges the habitiual wrongdoing but its difficult with ongoing habitual transgressions, and thee trangression like sexual misconducts have been done countless times ,and as a result along with that , the person also took the lords name in vain numerous times as a reault of such transgreasions without realizing by engaging in criminal behavior dozen times, and restitition is impossible . what to do in such a situation if wanting to return to righteous path and in hopes to return to god in world to come , is there a way out in such a tertible situation/scenario ?

Answer

Shalom!

Thank you for your question.

As we have responded to you several times, Rav Fried says the way for you to do repentance is that you should  commit to reading works of ethics such as the “Orchot Tzaddikim,” “Messilat Yesharim,”  all of which are available in English. And you write that restitution is not possible, then you should try to donate something to the community so the public can benefit from.

In Judaism, there is no such thing as G-d being angry forever. G-d does not want to punish you at all. G-d wants just wants a relationship with you…and it appears you are making these efforts!

We believe that all mankind who has sinned can be cleansed of their sin with prayer and “Teshuva”, meaning, repentance.

We see this, in fact, in the very first chapters of the Torah, where it says that G-d said to Cain: "Why are you upset, and why has your countenance fallen? If you do good [i.e. repent and change your ways], it will be good for you [that is, you will be forgiven]. But if you don’t do good, sin rests at the door..but you can overcome it!" (Genesis 4:6-7).

We commend you on your efforts to become better.



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